With the demise of the HD DVD format, the hi-def disc market is now left wide open to Blu-ray.

With well over three million units already sold in Europe, the PlayStation 3 games console is likely to be the dominant Blu-ray player on the market for some time to come.

But the prices of both Blu-ray players and discs are now coming down.

And so if you want a sleek HD player that'll look great next to your HDTV, the time to buy a BD player could be now.

Many Blu-ray discs are manufactured using so-called 24p technology, with 24 complete images per second flashing on the screen. From a DVD it’s usually 50 frames per second (50Hz) with the resulting picture sound suffering from occasional judder and not true-to-life sound. Almost all Blu-ray players can play discs at 24fps, but not many HD Ready or Full HD flatscreen TVs can show them.

All new Blu-ray players are compliant with Profile 1.1, also known as Final Standard Profile, which means they can play BonusView material from discs.

Although it doesn’t feature on any current Blu-ray releases, BonusView basically means picture-in-picture functionality, where a small window can appear in the corner of the screen while the movie player underneath.

Older Blu-ray machines (called Profile 1.0) can’t play BonusView – and can’t be upgraded – but unless you’re interested in special features and commentary tracks it’s an irrelevance. Those who are should bear in mind that Profile 2.0 players will be able to access exclusive online features embedded in Blu-ray discs.

All new Blu-ray discs contain 1080p video, which is the best quality and most detailed high definition video format. To watch in full detail, you’ll need a plasma or LCD TV with a Full HD resolution (1920x1080 pixels).

If you watch on a normal HD Ready TV (1366x768 pixels or similar) the 1080p image will be downscaled slightly to 720p, but still be extremely impressive compared to DVD.

All new Blu-ray players, whether they’re budget or high-end models, are fitted with the latest version of the HDMI output. Currently 1.3 is the newest, and is capable of letting you control both your TV and your Blu-ray player with one remote, handle 1080p resolution and the new Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master Audio sound codecs.